Archive for the ‘Religion’ Category

This weekend was a rare one in the fact that local politicians were canvasing the neighborhood and it seemed like Dawn of the Dead only it was afternoon and the zombies were local political hopefuls. The Sheriff hopeful leaves a three fold brochure outlining his experience. He is, in fact, very experienced having started in the Marine Corp and earning several awards and recognitions as a police officer. And then I notice the NRA affiliation which is not too surprising as I feel there is a relationship between service people and guns. Further down, something about supporting local charities and faith based stuff. OMG, faith based stuff.(more…)

So the Ten Commandments went up in a school in Giles County, VA because the staff there are morons. Don’t worry, I intend to substantiate this proposition with some clever reasoning. Let us consider how the Ten Commandments would fare if they were offered up as laws given that we already have the First Amendment.(more…)

This just in. Joseph Smith, L Ron Hubbard, Mohammad, Jesus, and the dad named Yahweh have decided to clear up one particular bit of spiritual judgement. If you are killed by a suicide bomber, you go straight to heaven. All sins forgiven. And you get to pick your flavor at the time of death by looking at the menu at the gates of Mormon heaven, Scientology heaven, Muslim heaven, Christian heaven and Jewish heaven.

Also on the list of endorsers is Martin Luther, John Calvin, Hitler, Stalin, and Ghengis Khan. Sun Tzu refused to sign because he thinks it’s obvious suicide bombers did not read his book.

Also, if you are a woman killed by a suicide bomber, you go to heaven as a man and get 99 virgin suicide bombers for your carnal pleasures in the afterlife. Carnal can include having them cook, clean, edit your manuscripts, or do your dirty laundry. Also, you won’t be required to put your dirty socks anywhere. Just throw them on the ground and let your former suicide bombing slaves pick it up while you force them to eat bacon.

Texas’s governor would be better off praying for aquaducts. Or better than rain, pray for a more equitable distribution of weather.

On the other hand, I feel a little respect for the idea of trying to put the praying citizens onto the same subject. Mostly, from the article I read, he managed to forget all of his constituents who wouldn’t pray regardless.

Prayer is wasted in my opinion but it’s also specifically harmless and a protected form of expression. So I’m going to move on and focus on things that actually matter.

I had forgotten about Terry Jones since the last time he had offered to burn a Koran. So when I see Dr. Hoffman blogging about Terry Jones, I thought I was getting a history lesson. Nope. Jones was at it again.

If you read the series of posts by Hoffman, you get the outrage of burning a Koran because the flames spread straight to Afghanistan and undermined our peace process. Also, Terry Jones is compared to PZ Meyers because PZ Meyers had tried a more benign yet similar defacing of holy books earlier.

There are several layers to the discussions that followed. It is unfortunate that Terry Jones’s act led to attacks in Afghanistan. Deliberately undermining that effort causes unnecessary casualties on all sides. I’ll entertain a troop withdraw. But if we as citizens are going to actually sabotage our national objectives over there, I think we’re doing something wrong. I think it’s wrong to do because anything that delays the Afghan process costs us money, resources, and our fellow soldiers who should be back within our borders as soon as we can safely recall them.(more…)

I have a Lutheran minister friend. I’m an atheist. I’d say that’s a counter intuitive pairing of people. What’s going on there?

With permission, we’ve decided to have a conversation about who we are that will be posted on my blog. It’s not a planned out conversation in the long run but naturally we have belief differences. That’s not all. We have upbringing differences. Also, we have some similarities including crossing paths in middle school.

This isn’t a debate, at least it’s not intended that way. I entirely doubt it’s useful to try and talk Matt down from his position. I’m not moving anywhere. So I thought maybe Matt’s position answers questions in his life that are relevant to him and that might be the better way to frame his position. Similarly even though I believe my position is a rational one, I didn’t simply think my way into being an atheist; I lived an experience that helped propel me to the position I now occupy.

I have two introductory emails: one from him and one from me. I’ll keep the conversation on the blog and feel free to leave comments especially questions that might be interesting for such a conversation.(more…)

Yesterday, Lorie had the idea to randomly pick a number from 1 to 76 which represented all the movies and shows we had queued up in our Netflix instant queue. She runs up to the loft and shouts down “24”. That happened to lead us to the documentary Jesus Camp.

For those who have seen Jesus Camp, there is nothing more that needs to be said. The documentary is about how children are being indoctrinated with the faith of their parents. This effect is put against the opinion of another Christian voice that represents moderate believers who think the separation between church and state is a good one. Additionally, the moderate doesn’t think Intelligent Design is a science and he slightly resonates with a live and let live attitude.(more…)

So I heard about Kevin Roose’s story via the Friendly Atheist. Kevin Roose transferred to Liberty for a college exchange program and wrote about his experiences. He’s offering a select number of his books for free in pairs. A potential reader needs to sign up with someone of a different belief system or world view to qualify for a pair of free books.

I googled a friend of mine who I remembered was a Lutheran minister and suggested we sign up. I haven’t seen him for years but I thought we were good friends during the time we did know each other and judging by his approval of my idea, I’d say he agrees.(more…)

As a service I provide, I’ll go ahead and sum up what I took from the post. Organized Humanism is the humanism that is more inclusive and doesn’t mind including positive things that are religiously inspired. Movement Humanism is an atheism of a different color that takes a more extreme position against religion throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I like Hoffman’s style of writing that’s why I read it even when I’m not in agreement with it. If you’ve got the time to read my post, maybe you should look at his too.

Hoffman has mentioned another differentiation. While I don’t have that post hot linked, I remember a post that suggested that polytheism is essentially a more civil religious format than theism. If you subscribe to a polytheistic viewpoint, then there’s an accepted religious relativism that goes along with it. And in a way, the god or gods you pick reflect more on you than you reflect on the gods, in my opinion. It makes me pause and wonder why I’m at my extreme.

I’m not really at odds with polytheists, I just don’t feel included because I have no religious inspiration. I have no love of the beauty of trying to mystify things by giving them attributes. I love reading myths but I rarely weave a consistent mythology among my friends. I’m not using that kind of communication. Maybe my life is less for it, but quite possibly I cannot appreciate those aesthetics as an individual. That’s the nicest position I can stay upon because it means you guys who disagree with me might be experiencing a really positive quality from your beliefs and I’m disagreeing simply because I’m incapable of having the experiences you suggest.(more…)